Sustainable Urban Development: A Literature Review

Department of Public Administration
University of Dhaka.
Course Name: Urban Development & Governance (PA- 213)
Assignment Topic:
Identify the most dominant urban environmental problems for Dhaka City and
suggest remedies for their solution.
Submitted To:
Dr. Momtaz Jahan
Professor
Department of Public Administration
University of Dhaka.
Submitted By:
Md Nezam Uddin Khan
Batch- 49th
Roll – 069
Department Of Public Administration
University Of Dhaka.
Date of Submission: 29 December, 2020.

Urban Development:
Urban is an area where remains a human settlement with a high population density and
infrastructure of built environments. An urban area consists of several materials such as high
population, a density area, and many infrastructures, commercial buildings, roads, bridges.
Urban area has also some surnames such as town, city, and suburb.
Now, the question is raised “What is urban development?
Urban development refers to the overall development of urban materials. It also indicates the
development of the social, cultural, economic and physical of urban areas. Generally, urban area
remains a crowd area. However, there is a question why urban areas are so crowd. People from
rural areas come to the urban areas for their livelihood. In rural areas, there is a shortage of
earning sources. People of rural areas think if they transmit to the urban areas, their livelihood
will be better. As a result, urban area becomes a congested area. In addition, many problems rise
in the urban areas. Industrials plants, garments, manufactural companies are built in those urban
areas. That is why various problems evolve in the urban areas. Social, economic, cultural
problems are seen much in those areas. In order to eradicate those problems, several steps should
be taken by the urban authorities. By taking those steps, authorities will expect to absolve all
those complications.
Urbanization:
A procedure of urban growth that leads to a greater proportion of people being concentrated into
towns and cities is called urbanization. From the definition of urbanization, we found a word
urban growth. It means a steady increase in population and the amount of industrialization of a
settlement. The tendency of people shifting from rural areas to the cities or towns and reducing
in the proportion of people living in remote areas is also meant an urbanization. Urbanization
causes industrialization. People`s shifting to the cities causes to be constructed several industrial
plants. There should be distinguished between urbanization and urban growth. Whereas
urbanization refers to the proportion of the total national population living in areas classified as
urban, urban growth strictly refers to the absolute number of people living in those areas.

Urbanization maintains a range of discipline comprising urban planning, geography, architecture,
sociology, economic and public health.
This term is also linked with the modernization, industrialization and the sociological process of
rationalization. Urbanization generates massive social, economic and environment changes that
provide an opportunity for sustainability with the “potential to use resources more efficiently, to
create more sustainable land use and to protect the biodiversity of natural ecosystems."
Bangladesh is a small country but its population is huge. Over 18 core people live in this small
country. Most of the people of Bangladesh live in rural areas. However, there have shortage of
earning sources in village areas. For this reason, people tend to come in cities to get better
livelihood. There create a haphazard situation in cities. Dhaka is the capital city of Bangladesh.
Almost two core people live in this little city. Most of the people remain in this city because of
their livelihood betterment. However, this congested situation extremely affects to its
environmental materials, social activities.
Causes of urbanization:
 Natural Population Increase
 Rural – Urban Migration
 Social Factors
 Modernization
Population is dynamic field. Increase of population rate has been rising rapidly. This is one of the
causes of urbanization. Nowadays, people shift their living place from rural areas to urban or city
areas. In rural areas, people don`t get various facilities or their earning sources are not sufficient
as there arises a tendency to migrate to a city or town. Other causes of urbanization social
factors. Social factors include better quality of living, education, facilities and business
opportunities. Living in a city can be culturally and economically beneficial since it can provide
greater opportunities for access to the labor market, better education, housing, and safety
conditions, and reduce the time and expense of commuting and transportation. In urban areas,
people can get better technology systems, newer housing and infrastructure. There has always

been a deficit of hospital facilities in rural areas but people can easily get better health related
facilities.
Benefits of urbanization:
 Efficiency
 Trade & commerce
 Culture & science
 Educational facilities
 Social in integration
 Improvements in economy
Through urbanization, people can get some benefits. Coming from rural areas, many people join
several industrial plants such as garments or any kind of job. They are being adroit in their own
working fields through continuous work. Thus, they become human resources for a country.
Urbanization enhances the country`s trade, commerce and business sectors by providing more
working sectors or jobs and a more diverse economy. Urbanization increases the improvements
of culture & science. As diverse cultures interact, work, and communicate with one another in
close proximity, cultures are integrated more smoothly. In addition, people can access to better
educational facilities and living standards (like better sanitation, healthcare & housing). In
Bangladesh, most of the people tend to migrate Dhaka mega city. Both men & women employ in
various sectors. From various sectors, garment sector solely is responsible for 80% of
Bangladesh`s export earnings. The workers of those garments are mostly female. Thus, the
employment of women has been increasing. Nowadays, female contributes much to the
improvement of Bangladesh. It is remarkable that Dhaka mega city contributes to about 13% of
the country`s total GDP.
Another reason why people come to the city area is educational facilities. In rural areas, people
cannot get better education. There have few educational institutions in rural areas and sometimes
those institutions fail to provide better education to the students. That is why people come to the
city areas as their children get better educational facilities.
By shifting from remote areas to urban area, people find their jobs as their livelihood is going
well. As a result, country`s economy is being improved. Much of the organized service sector